


Unwritten Truths

by abvj



Category: Titanic (1997)
Genre: AU Post Movie, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-20
Updated: 2012-12-20
Packaged: 2017-11-21 17:42:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/600427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abvj/pseuds/abvj
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>It’s her idea to head west, into the horizon. Jack merely obliges. </i> Rose and Jack and the future they never had.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unwritten Truths

**Author's Note:**

  * For [trollprincess](https://archiveofourown.org/users/trollprincess/gifts).



> AU post movie. I tried to do these two justice. It was more difficult than I imagined. Thank you to Ash for the beta.

The Carpathia rocks steadily back and forth in motion with the water, rain misting her skin, and Rose burrows deeper into her coat, draws into herself for warmth. 

In the distance, there is a fleck of light, a warm glow she spots easily. If she squints, she can make out the outline of Lady Liberty from memory, guiding Rose home with her glowing torch. 

Jack sees it too, stands to move beside her. He lets out a sigh and it rattles her cold bones. 

“What now?” she asks quietly. Jack merely shakes his head. 

Between them, her hand reaches for his and holds on. 

 

 

 

In New York, the survivors are greeted by reporters and families, thousands of people clamoring for their attention, murmuring about being _the lucky ones._

Rose and Jack keep their heads down, wishing to remain anonymous. Cal and Mother think her to be dead, and she does not wish to correct them. Mother will do her part, Rose knows, telling journalists and anyone who will listen a truly harrowing tale of hardship and sacrifice, how she lost her daughter to the unforgiving sea. It’s better than the alternative, better than the facing the truth. A very large part of Rose wants to ruin the lie for her mother just to be spiteful, her payment for services poorly rendered, but her heart knows calm now, something similar to peace, and she will never go back. 

They stay in New York for the first few weeks, picking up odd jobs and living off the kindness of strangers. Some nights they make love under the stars, the warm summer heat settling near the base of her spine as his fingers work her over softly, tracing the curves of her as if her skin was a piece of unmarred canvass for him to bend to his will, to work into a masterpiece. 

After, he always holds her too close, too tightly, and whispers _come Josephine, my flying machine_ into her shoulder just so he can hear her laugh. 

 

 

 

For months, all anyone lives and breathes are tales of the ill-fated Titanic, the stories of both the living and the dead, speculation about what went wrong. 

Rose doesn’t need the reminders. 

When she closes her eyes, all she can see is the depths of the ocean, the vast blackness threatening to swallow her whole. All she can feel is icy cold water against her skin. 

At night, she can still hear the dying screams echoing in the distance. 

It’s her idea to head west, into the horizon. Jack merely obliges. 

 

 

 

Santa Monica is their intended destination, but they don’t quite make it that far. 

They hitchhike their way through northern Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana before hitting a snag in Illinois. 

Rose finds work as a seamstress, Jack in some sort of construction outlet, and they move into a room above the garage of an elderly widow who charges them next to nothing as long as they help with the yard and meals. 

On Sunday afternoons, they venture into the city, Rose’s nose buried in a book while Jack sketches the skyline. The simplicity is nice, the respite from a life she always wanted, but didn’t realize how difficult it would be to lead. Next to her on the bench, Jack sighs and she feels the contentment behind it; wishes she could breathe it in and make it her own, wishes to be more like him – able to head into the horizon and towards the unknown without a second thought, taking life as it comes. 

Rose is learning, but it is a slow process. 

She was born with everything and grew into nothing, and she knows first hand how harsh reality can be. Her mother, in all her infinite wisdom, merely taught Rose how to hide it better than most, how to hold her head high with a square jaw and act as though the world was at her fingertips instead of just out of reach. 

Today, as the sounds of Jack’s pencils sliding over the pages of his sketchbook press into her skin, she stares down at the book in her lap. All she can see are her dirty hands turning the page, the calluses lining her fingers from too many hours spent holding sewing needles obvious and glaring. 

Idly, she wonders what her mother would think of her now. A smile spreads across her mouth at the mere thought. 

 

 

 

She had asked Cal once, sometime in the beginning, _don’t you want more than this?_

He had laughed, of course, in that smug way of his, head tilted back as his shoulders shook carelessly. _What’s better than this, darling? Tell me and I’ll get it for you,_ he replied, reaching for her hand. His thumb drew lines into the soft skin of her palm. Rose didn’t pull away, but she didn’t move into his touch either.

Jack had painted such an appealing future that day on the boat, sun grazing the horizon in the distance. He sparked something in her, brought to life a part of her she had long since forgotten existed, inspired her to fight, to want to live, to give herself a voice worth hearing. During those few short days she knew him, those hours they spent with one another where the rest of the world ceased to exist, she held onto the vision of the future they painted with every ounce of strength she had. 

The stark contrast of reality wears her thin. 

 

 

 

“Are you happy?” Jack asks her. 

Rose’s mouth turns, but she doesn’t smile. “I’m trying to be,” she says, because she doesn’t want to mar this life, this life she fought for, this life she survived for, with a lie too. 

 

 

 

What she should say, the truth she should reveal but doesn’t quite now how is this: 

She doesn’t really know what happiness is. Rose can’t picture it outside of childish wants and wishes. Knows nothing of it besides being five years old with her father’s warm laughter filtering throughout the room as she danced around in her brand new ballet shoes. 

For years, she had carried those sorts of memories with her, the ones not marred by her father’s death and the scandals it revealed, so she could look back on it and think _this is what happiness is._

But the distance between now and then is vast, the person she was then completely separate from the woman Jack talked out of jumping and the woman she is trying to be now. 

Rose thinks this is what happiness is – this feeling of calm, of serenity she gets when Jack looks at her the way he does, when he crawls into bed after a long day and whispers _I missed you_ into the soft skin of her shoulder – but what does she know? 

 

 

 

He still likes to draw her – sketches the outline of her features on the backs of napkins, paints portraits on cheap canvas whenever he gets a free moment. Sometimes, in the soft candlelight, she allows Jack to draw her like one of his French girls, sheds her clothes and lays herself completely bare for him. Rose closes her eyes, allows the sound of the charcoal scraping against paper calm her nerves and tries not to choke on the memories – the smell of fresh paint, the warmth of his gaze, the slow steady sway of the boat that had both soothed and rubbed her nerves raw. 

It’s a curious thing, after, when he allows her to glance at the finished project. 

It was difficult, she remembers, the first time she saw herself through his eyes, and it is no different now. If she could compare the images it would be striking – the jagged edges of now compared to the soft roundness of before. Her hair is shorter than before, her angles sharp. 

Rose likes this version better. 

 

 

 

Jack doesn’t understand why she holds onto the necklace. He finds it hidden in her sock drawer one afternoon. Rose keeps it behind underwear and stockings, papers that needed to be kept safe, meant to be forgotten. 

This is the only time they ever argue, the only time they ever shout at each other. 

Jack can’t fathom it, says he can’t understand why she is intent on being so poor, why she feels the need to punish herself. He stands before her, charcoal smudged along his cheekbone, paint dried under his fingernails. Rose struggles to not find it endearing. 

“You of all people should understand,” she shouts. Jack evens his gaze with hers, crosses his arms over his chest. It’s the first time she can remember seeing him angry, it’s the first time she has ever been angry with him. “I don’t want to feel as though I owe him anything.” 

They’re silent for a long time. 

 

 

 

He finds her afterwards outside, the cool of the night settling in. The stillness of night filters around them, sets her on edge. Jack presses a cup of coffee into her hands, his fingers lingering against hers, and when he settles onto the stoop beside her she moves into him, breathes in a bit of his warmth. 

Jack murmurs his apologies into her hair. 

“We’re going to be okay,” he tells her, and she is reminded, all too easily, that his optimism was the first thing she fell in love with. Rose’s mouth lifts, but she doesn’t quite smile. “Trust me.”

Rose rests her head on her shoulder and closes her eyes. “I trust you,” she breathes.


End file.
